The man in back

     He sat in the back of the auditorium blending in with the darkness. It had been twenty years since he left and never looked back leaving a wife and young son to be alone and in love with the bottle. For years he lived on the streets occasionally working but mostly begging and stealing to support his habit. He was saved five years ago when after a brutal beating by three men he ended up in a rehab facility where he got sober and remained so at least for today. His son went on to become a well-known artist and entertainer who headlined tonight’s show that he learned about from posters he saw in a coffee shop. He wasn’t ready to confront his boy who surly had forgotten about his drunken father a long time ago. As the lights dimmed and the crowd came alive a tall and solemn figure came on stage and sat behind the piano. “Thank you very much” he said to the audience, “I would like to dedicate this first song to all the children who lost a parent to an addiction” The song was a blueprint of the man in the backs life and he openly wept, the beautiful music drowning out his pain and sorrow. At the end of the show as people began to leave the man in the back stayed trying to hold on to every note, every word, every moment he could trying to get up the nerve to go back stage, but he didn’t, not now, not tonight but maybe tomorrow, maybe.

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